


Wreckage

by Sproid



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Angst, Break Up, F/M, Reconciliation, relationships are hard
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-02
Updated: 2012-09-02
Packaged: 2017-11-13 09:08:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/501824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sproid/pseuds/Sproid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>They say there’s wreckage washing up / All along the coast / No one seems to know too much / Or who got hit the most</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wreckage

No-one knows they're together until they're not.

Then the evidence is all over the base, and if no-one knows exactly what happened, the wreckage is plain for all to see. Natasha closes off, prowls around looking so deadly that no-one dares approach her, and takes more missions that involve her jetting off to the far reaches of the world. Clint's humour takes a turn for the bitter, he's quicker to lash out with violence at the slightest provocation, and he fools no-one with his pretence that nothing is wrong. On the occasions that the two of them meet in the corridors, the event is marked either with glares, one icy and one heated, or by furious remarks flung and returned with low voices that no-one can hear but everyone can see hit their mark.

No-one knows they're together until they're not, at which point it's obvious that neither one of them have escaped the storm unscathed.

\-- -- -- -- --

The wreckage carries on washing up for weeks.

Fury calls Coulson and Hill into his office when Natasha and Clint almost come to blows, following a run-in when they both returned from missions at the same time. Bad timing on everyone's part, but it highlighted the need to resolve the situation one way or the other.

"What the hell happened between those two?" Fury demands, looking between Hill and Coulson. "Two of our best agents start a relationship that we only find out about when it ends, and now neither of them will talk to each other or anyone else about it? I've got agents actively avoiding anywhere they think Barton and Romanoff are going to be, requesting assignments that don't involve working with them, and while I don't think either of them would wilfully hurt another agent, at this point I can understand why no-one feels particularly safe around them. If this carries on, I'm going to have to send either or both of them to separate bases. It'd be a damn shame, but if they can't sort out whatever went on between them, I don't have much of a choice. Please, one of you tell me that you can sort this out."

Coulson and Hill share a dubious glance. 

"I tried talking to Barton the week after... whatever it was that happened," Coulson says. "He wasn't particularly responsive." In fact he'd told Coulson to fuck off and mind his own business, something which Coulson pretended not to have heard and has no intention of reporting.

Fury's look says he knows exactly what Coulson isn't saying. "Hill?"

"Natasha told me not to ask," Hill tells him. "I wasn't particularly inclined to argue with her."

"Alright," Fury sighs. "Romanoff and Barton are stubborn as hell, but I want you both to try again."

"Do you really think they'll listen?" Hill asks.

"I think they've had a month of making the situation worse, and I'm damn sure neither of them is happy about that, which hopefully will mean they're more inclined to talk to you now," Fury says. "Off the record, my personal opinion is that those two are of more use to each other together than they are apart. If we can't make them see that, then we've failed them and shot ourselves in the foot in the process. Understood?"

Coulson and Hill nod. "Yes sir."

"Good. Now get to it."

\-- -- -- -- --

Clint heads as high up within the helicarrier as he can, into one of the storage rooms where he pushes open a window whose lock is a lost cause, and leans out of it so he can watch the ocean waves below. Their steady splash against the hull is calming in a way he desperately needs. 

Nearly coming to blows with Natasha had sent adrenaline running through his veins; now he's shaking, jittery, tense, with no way to release it. He'd squared off against her with a sick resignation and hope, had been ready for whatever she might throw at him, thinking that it might put an end to their antagonistic limbo one way or another. For a moment he'd thought it might just work, and then she'd dropped her fists, looked him up and down and walked away. He'd thought the anger had been bad enough. The indifference afterwards had been worse.

"Clint."

With a start, Clint whirls away from the window, fists coming up automatically before he sees Coulson standing in the doorway across the room. "Jesus, Coulson," he says, hating the waver in his voice.

"Sorry," Coulson says. He steps in, shuts the door and returns the room to its half-light. There's a pause as he looks Clint over. "And I'm Phil right now." 

Clint lowers his hands as Phil crosses the room, crosses his arms to hide the shake in them. "You heard about me and Natasha, huh?" he asks when Phil stops a few steps away. There's no point pretending it hadn't happened, and he's lost the energy to fight Phil on this one any more.

Nodding, Phil asks quietly, "What happened, Clint?"

With a helpless shrug, Clint asks "Which time?" His voice breaks half way through, and he scrubs a hand across his face in a futile attempt to regain his composure, but his legs are weak and the lump in his throat won't go away.

"Any time."

"I don't know," Clint chokes out, and then his legs really won't hold him up any more and he can't stop the tears either. He hits the floor with a thump, lets the wall behind him hold him up, and buries his head in his hands while he wishes desperately that all of this would just go away, that he and Natasha could go back to how they were before.

"Easy," he hears Phil murmur, and then there's the sound of rustling as Phil sits next to him, followed by a strong arm around his shoulders. Clint hates that he needs this, hates that Phil is seeing him like this, but there's no way he can bottle it in any more so he turns his face into Phil's shoulder and just lets it come. It doesn't last long, a brief but unstoppable outburst of tears, and he doesn't feel much better afterwards but at least it's out of the way for now.

"Sorry," he rasps out when he's done, throat raw. He pulls away and Phil lets him, but doesn't go anywhere.

Phil shrugs and hands him a tissue. "Don't be." There's not much arguing with that. "What happened between you and Natasha, Clint? You were together; what changed that?"

Clint tips his head back against the cool wall and shuts his eyes. "I'm not sure," he says helplessly. "We were... It wasn't perfect, y'know, but we were doing pretty good. We were happy. Well, I was happy. I guess she wasn't. I think I..." He trails off, and Phil reaches out to squeeze his shoulder. Clint draws in a shuddering breath. "I think I screwed up, Phil," he says hoarsely. "I started talking about long term stuff, relationships and all that crap, and I just kinda assumed that she was thinking about the same things even if she didn't say it, y'know?"

An affirmative sound comes from Phil. "That's when it went wrong?"

"I guess? Not right away, but we started having arguments about stupid things. Last month we had a big fight about something, I don't even remember what, and it just got way out of control. I... I said a lot of things I shouldn't have done. Natasha said... I hope she didn't mean what she said, but I kinda think she did. She really doesn't like me very much right now." Tears spring up behind his closed eyelids, and Clint tries not to let them escape but they won't be held back. He wipes them away with the back of his hand, raises his head and looks at Phil. "I'm pretty sure that's not going to change any time soon," he adds, and only just keeps his voice under control as he says, "I don't think she even cares any more."

Phil shakes his head. "That's not true." He raises a hand before Clint can speak. "Hear me out, Clint. I'm not denying that things are messed up between the two of you, and I can't pretend to know what Natasha's feelings are on anything, but I do know that she cares. If she didn't, she'd have walked away weeks ago. Instead she's still fighting with you. Whether that's a good thing or not, I don't know, but she's still emotionally invested one way or the other."

"What does that mean?" Clint asks.

"I can't answer that one," Phil says. Clint knows where this is going, and he doesn't like it. "You'll have to ask Natasha."

Phil stands up and brushes his suit off. Clint tips his head back against the wall to watch him cross the room, and doesn't give in to the urge to ask him to stay. As much as he wants the company, the reminder that at least someone cares about him, he knows he needs the time to think. "Thanks," he says instead, because he does at least feel somewhat calmer now.

"Any time," Phil replies.

He shuts the door behind him quietly, and leaves Clint alone in the dim room with his thoughts and the ocean for company.

\-- -- -- -- --

Natasha stalks towards the bowels of the ship as quickly as she can, not giving way to the anger she feels until she's reached an empty stretch where the only things she can damage are the metal walls and pipes surrounding her. Then she lets loose with accuracy that would be terrifying in the field, but down here merely results in a few dented pipes and a matching set of bruised and bloody knuckles. She slams her foot into the wall, delivers a roundhouse kick to an upright pipe, punches dents into the casing for the water taps, and it's not enough because she's furious with herself for not finishing the job with Clint, with Clint for not leaving far before now. 

Lurking beneath her anger is the shame that she'd almost resorted to scaring him off with her fists. 

Layered over that is the thought that as awful as that would have been, it wouldn't have hurt him as much as letting this continue is probably going to. 

She's tired and aching and still hasn't got rid of the anger and the guilt when she sees Maria coming, a faint silhouette that steps in and out of the pools of light along the corridor.

"Go back to Fury and tell him I don't want to talk," Natasha says when Maria gets closer.

"I'm not here for Fury," Maria tells her, standing on the edge of the shadow Natasha's currently in. "I'm here for you. And you do want to talk."

"What I want is a sparring partner," Natasha grits out. The static metal down here isn't enough to give her a challenge, to let her clear her mind.

Maria slides her jacket off and throws it to the side. "You can have the one you want, but you get the one you don't want along with it."

"Fine," Natasha says. She doesn't have to have the conversation; she can leave as soon as they're done, and Maria won't be able to stop her.

"So, why'd you and Clint break it off?" Maria asks as they circle each other.

"None of your business," Natasha replies, and attacks Maria in a flurry of blows, lands a few and retreats to await the counter-attack. When none comes, she curses violently.

Unfazed, Maria reminds her, "You don't get one without the other. Why'd you and Clint break it off?"

"Hell if I know." Maria raises an eyebrow. Natasha gives in. "Clint's an idiot," she bites out. That's not really the truth though, and it doesn't make her feel any better to lie about it. "I'm as much of an idiot," she adds quietly.

"How so?" Maria asks.

"One question at a time," Natasha tells her. She's not ready to share that one just yet.

"Fair enough," Maria allows. This time when Natasha attacks, Maria doesn't hold back and gives as good as she gets. That's pretty impressive on a normal day, but when Natasha's already physically tired and mentally distracted, it's even more so. 

They call a truce, and Natasha stumbles tiredly backwards to sink down onto a pipe. Opposite her, Maria does the same. There's quiet until Natasha starts talking.

"Clint started throwing around words like 'commitment' and 'love'. He wanted to think long term, and he should have known better. We don't - _I_ don't – do that. I probably should have responded differently, but when I didn't say anything, he just let it drop. I thought we were alright. Apparently we weren't."

Rolling her arm carefully, stretching out the limb, Maria asks, "And the last few weeks?"

Natasha doesn't like remembering the futile, aggressive encounters they've had, nor the event that sparked them all off. Keeping them to herself hasn't helped though, so she tells Maria. "We had a... rather nasty fight. I pretty much told him he was deluding himself if he ever thought there could be anything lasting between us, along with... a lot of other things I'm not proud of. He made his feelings about me perfectly clear after that."

Frustrated, Natasha stands, kicks the pipe with her foot. "I thought that was it, that we'd said everything we needed to, but every time we see each other we seem to find something else to argue about. I keep trying to put an end to it, but he won't let me. When I saw him today, I thought that if I could make it clear that I didn't want him around, we could finally let it go. It'd be over, we'd know where we stood, and that would be that."

"And?"

"I couldn't do it." She'd been so close, so ready to destroy Clint with words that she knew would hurt him for weeks to come, finish the job by pushing him away physically and making sure he'd stay there. Too close, because then she'd realised that for all she'd turned him down before, she didn't actually want to get rid of him forever. Only by then it had been too late. Instead she'd closed off, made sure he didn't see anything, and left. 

She turns to Maria, and she hates having to ask for help, but this is not something she knows how to resolve. "I don't want him gone. But after today, I can't think of any reason he'd come back. We're just going to carry on like this, and it's not fair on either of us, but I don't know how to stop it."

Maria stands up. "You already know what I'm going to suggest you do."

Natasha sighs. "You want me to talk to Clint."

"I do."

"That didn't work out so well last time," Natasha reminds her, watching as Maria walks over to collect her jacket.

"You weren't telling him everything last time. Try it this time. You might be surprised at how much of a difference it makes."

"I'm not used to telling people everything," Natasha mutters, crossing her arms over her chest. She recognises it for the defensive gesture it is, but knows Maria will understand.

"So tell him the important bits, and leave the rest for later," Maria suggests.

Natasha doesn't like it but she knows Maria is right. 

"Thank you," she says as Maria starts to walk away.

"Thank me when you've worked things out with Clint," Maria tells her with a small smile. She leaves Natasha beneath the bare light bulb hanging from the ceiling, to wonder for the first time if it's possible to repair the damage they've done to themselves.

\-- -- -- -- --

Late that night, when only a skeleton crew mans the carrier and there are no prying eyes, they come to each other. The corridor is silent and empty; their footsteps echo as they approach each other, as cautious as they have ever been. Clint's hands are shaking, Natasha's legs are not entirely steady, both hoping the unspoken truce can last long enough to get their words out.

"I... uh, I was just coming to find you," Clint says.

"What a coincidence," Natasha replies, and then curses herself. Where once that would have been affectionate, now it sounds far too cutting. "Sorry," she says before Clint can respond, giving him neither the chance nor the cause to be defensive. "I didn't mean that how it sounded."

Taken aback, but recognising the slip for what it was, Clint says hastily, "No, it's fine."

Natasha looks around the brightly lit corridor. "This isn't the best place to have this conversation," she remarks.

Clint agrees. "My room?"

Drawing in a breath, Natasha says, "Mine is closer." She appreciates it when Clint doesn't comment on the choice, doesn't ask her if she's sure, but instead simply nods.

"Lead the way."

The damage can't be fixed in one night, not when they're both exhausted from weeks of clashing against each other and knocking the other down. Gouges from hurtful words can't be repaired when neither of them knows what to say to comfort the other. Differences can't be reconciled when Clint still believes in love and Natasha doesn't yet. The rift between them is large and littered with the splinters of what they had, but standing together in a small room, stumbling over words that need to come from the heart and the brain and the soul all at once, it's not one that's impossible to bridge.

They stop closer, reach out, and it's the wrong time for pushing but they both need to just hold for a while. The darkness of the room surrounds them, and somehow that makes it easier to whisper confidences to each other.

"I get scared sometimes," Natasha says, her arms wrapped around Clint, breathing in when he breathes out, keeping calm to the rhythm of their breathing.

Clint huffs out a surprised laugh and hugs her closer for a moment. "You hide it well. I won't tell anyone." Quietly, he adds, "I get hurt sometimes. Emotionally, I mean."

"It's the only thing you don't show," Natasha murmurs, and closes her arms more tightly around him.

"Let's not do this again," Clint whispers, and buries his face in her hair, hoping she can't feel his tears.

"I don't think I could," Natasha replies, and turns her head so their cheeks touch and their tears mingle as they trace their way down. "We won't."

It's not a promise but a wish, made on the first spark of hope in a dark night. For now they are separate, broken and limping along, but the storm is over. And they have a star in the sky to guide them back together.


End file.
